Dr Ti-Han Chang

With her expertise in Taiwan Studies and Environmental Studies, she further delivers a module specifically dedicated to the postcolonial history, literature and society in Taiwan. This is delivered on the BA (Hons) Asia Pacific Studies programme and another module on environmental vulnerability and resilience of the Korean peninsula in the MA North Korean Studies programme. Ti-han is particularly interested in postcolonial ecocriticism, which draws her attention to research topics such as nonhuman agency, borders and nations, climate change and displacement. She currently undertakes two different research projects: (1) the impacts of climate change on the migratory patterns and policies in the Pacific region; (2) the development of Taiwan ecocriticism and the translation of Taiwan literature. Ti-han welcomes proposals for doctoral research on environmental humanities and postcolonial studies of Taiwan and the wider Asia Pacific region.

At UCLan, Ti-han is an active member in multiple research centres. For example, she is the deputy director at the Centre of Austronesian Studies (COAST), and she further contributes her research works through the Norther Institute of Taiwan Studies (NorITS) and the Centre for Migration, Diaspora and Exile (MIDEX). Since 2019, Ti-han was appointed to be the Environmental Lead for UoA25 Area Studies, contributing to her UoA's submission to REF2021 and the coming REF2029. Externally, Ti-han serves as a board member of the European Association of Taiwan Studies (EATS). In the past, she also worked as a treasurer for the Francophone Association of Taiwan Studies (AFET).

Since 2019, she is engaged with multiple research projects which investigate the Pacific climate migrants and the narratives of the displaced. Currently, she is preparing her monograph on contemporary eco-writings in Taiwan. In the meanwhile, she also works on two co-edited academic publications: Identities on the Move: A Transdisciplinary Study of Global Displacement (Springer, forthcoming 2024) and Taiwan as Ocean (Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2025), as well as a translation anthology, A Taiwanese Eco-literature Reader (Columbia University Press, forthcoming 2025).

She has been awarded twice (£30,000) by the Taiwan Ministry of Culture to run Spotlight Taiwan projects which aimed at promoting culture, literature and scholarly knowledge of Taiwan in the wider region of Lancashire. When she served as the treasurer/board member in AFET, through concerted efforts, the academic organisation also received the French-Taiwanese Cultural Foundation Award (€25,000).

With her colleagues from NorITS, they also jointly run the Taiwan On-Air Podcast 空中直播台灣 series, which releases episodes of interviews with academics, writers, film directors, media artists, about their works on Taiwan.

Ti-han currently second-supervises the doctoral thesis on “Religion as an opportunity for climate action in the Pacific Islands”.